Class Description
Awakening the Heart: Practicing the “Divine Abodes” (Lovingkindness, Compassion, Joy, Equanimity): A Weekend Non-Residential Retreat
The Divine Abodes (Brahmaviharas) of lovingkindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity, are the places of the open, boundless, and luminous awakened heart. In this non-residential retreat, we will learn the formal practices of lovingkindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity, and offer guidance for bringing these practices into daily life. All of these practices strengthen self-confidence, self-acceptance, generosity of spirit, and steadiness of mind and heart, revealing our fundamental kindness and caring. The retreat will be held in the context of silence, alternating sitting meditation and walking meditation. Core instructions in the different practices will be offered, along with talks, discussion, and brief daily guided movement sessions.
A Weekend Retreat and Training with Donald Rothberg
Join us in exploring how to bring presence, purpose, and heart to both your personal journey and your engagement with the world. All are welcome – no prior meditation experience required.
Class Details
Biography
Donald Rothberg, Ph.D., a member of the Teachers Council at the Spirit Rock Meditation Center in California, teaches widely on concentration and insight meditation practice, lovingkindness practice, transforming the judgmental mind, mindful communication, working with conflict, and socially engaged Buddhism. He has practiced insight meditation since 1976, and has also received training in Tibetan Dzogchen, body-based psychotherapy, and trauma work. He has helped guide many training programs in socially engaged spirituality, both Buddhist-based and interfaith, and is the author of The Engaged Spiritual Life: A Buddhist Approach to Transforming Ourselves and the World, and the co-editor of Ken Wilber in Dialogue. A former teacher at the University of Kentucky, he has been teaching weekend retreats regularly in Louisville for more than 15 years.